Last spring, Frank Turkaly tried to kill himself. A retiree in a Pittsburgh suburb living on disability checks, he was estranged from friends and family, mired in credit card debt and taking medication for depression, cholesterol, diabetes and high blood pressure.

That’s exactly what happened. They also choose to disconnect from their children by putting them in day care, because their own careers was the most important thing in the world. Consequently, their children learned to not need their parents, so they rarely contact them.

5
posted on 06/04/2013 6:18:30 AM PDT
by Jonty30
(What Islam and secularism have in common is that they are both death cults)

Combine high expectations with a faltering economy, and the risk goes up.

For the most part Americans have not accepted the fact that we are running on borrowed fumes. We have squandered most of the advantages we had as a country as the boomers squandered their savings. Then we have trouble facing the fact that nobody gives a damn. No accomplishments past, present or future means they (we) get no respect. I say this as the last boomer (born 1963). There will be nothing left when I get old except for what I am able to create myself.

I can see becoming depressed in this corrupt "obamanation" we now live in. The progressives think with each "change" they ram down our throats it always comes over time acceptable to the conservatives, we get over it. Well it doesn't and we don't. For example the repeal of DADT, it is depressing to thing that faggotry is acceptable in the DOD. It just is. And that is just one example of it all slipping away. After a while some feel like they just don't fit in anymore.

FR helps me fight the gloom.

13
posted on 06/04/2013 6:24:27 AM PDT
by central_va
(I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)

A retiree in a Pittsburgh suburb living on disability checks, he was estranged from friends and family, mired in credit card debt and taking medication for depression, cholesterol, diabetes and high blood pressure.

From personal and professional experience:

1. File for Chapter 7 BK.

2. Become a Fuhrmaniac ("Eat to Live", by Joel Fuhrman).

The first recommendation is based on recent work experience dealing with troubled borrowers. Considering his situation, he's never going to get credit again (his credit score is likely in the low 500s at best), so get that credit albatross off his neck. It will stop those calls from debt collectors.

I've been following Fuhrman's plan 85-90%, and I'm off metformin, looking forward to getting off Crestor (it's a goal). Another 15 lbs, and I'll be at my weight when I graduated from Jump School 37 years ago.

I'm not passing judgment on moral hazard. I've seen enough moral hazard demonstrated by Wall Street to give this guy a break.

15
posted on 06/04/2013 6:25:36 AM PDT
by Night Hides Not
(The Tea Party was the earthquake, and Chick Fil A the tsunami...100's of aftershocks to come.)

Our government is a very oppressive invasive system. Thy have stolen the futures of both the old and young. There is $13.4T that has been stolen form Social Security dating back to JFK. The federal retirement system is unfunded so add this liability to the debt. The whole debt of our den of thieves government is somewhere between $100T and $200T. The government has crashed real estate values. The Fed has inflated the dollar to somewhere around 10% of its value.

Where is the good news?

16
posted on 06/04/2013 6:27:07 AM PDT
by mountainlion
(Live well for those that did not make it back.)

Baby Boomers are the worst generation this country has ever seen. Think about every bad thing in this country, and it was promoted, normalized, and propagated by the Baby Boomers. Not all of them of course. Just a sizable percentage.

18
posted on 06/04/2013 6:29:23 AM PDT
by demshateGod
(The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.)

I’m a retired baby boomer, a widow, and was a hippie back in the day. But unlike Frank Turkaly I have no credit card or mortgage debt, do not take any prescription medications, and am not estranged from my family. Rather my grandchildren live within walking distance and are a part of my everyday life. I’m involved with their activities and have my own interests too. I wouldn’t change a thing. Offing myself is not in the picture.

Being a white man in your 50’s in America today is to be a punching bag for every selfish group in this declining country.

Unless you are employed by the government the higher salary you have earned from decades of hard work makes you a target for every cost cutter in the company. Your knowledge and experience is devalued and every special interest group with a quota demand wants you out. The politically correct rules require you to walk on eggshells, choose your words carefully and be sensitive to everyone around you but anyone can ridicule and attack you with impunity. You are typically ordered to clean up the messes made by young, politically correct careerists who are given authority without responsibility, screw things up and then move on to something else.

Wives and children in this era of self-absorbtion are typically unappreciative of all that you have done for them. You are expected to be a bottomless pit of money and fix things when there is a problem. Other than that none of them care about you.

Social Security is insolvent and may or may not be around when you need it. Probably not.

All you have to look forward to is doing things for other people who will never do anything for you.

I'm thinking maybe 'cause this is the least-churched genration in American history.Most of their parents are divorced, sex is cheap, and life itself is no longer sacred (numbing affect of legal infanticide).

22
posted on 06/04/2013 6:32:57 AM PDT
by Psalm 73
("Gentlemen, you can't fight in here - this is the War Room".)

Not only Boomers but we all face a bunch of carpola in this life. Greed both in Govt. and some in corporate have helped dent or wreck savings for many yet personal responsibility is the biggest issue in this matter. Suicide is not the answer and having a long term focus beyond this troubled life to the one eternal puts it all in perspective. Easy for me to say right? and dare I speak for all situations.

Sometime ago Forbes ran feature about why do we feel so bad when we have it so good. In one of her better articles Peggy Noonan got it right. One of her statements (paraphrasing) was that the Baby Boomers are the first generation in the history of mankind that believed it could create a Utopian society (I recall that she pointed out that other generations understood that his was reserved for the afterlife). Second, she pointed out that the boomers were realizing that they are increasingly responsible for wrongs of society.

You can never draw too much from studies like this because circumstances change so much from period to period and also you don’t know how good information from the past was. First, people died earlier in the past so there were less old people to be available to kill themselves. Second, people may have killed themselves all the time in the past but it was socially taboo and families probably covered it up, perhaps even with the help of police and coroners.

If there is a reason, though, my guess would be that each generation has become more self-centered, starting with the Boomers. And if life doesn’t work out for self-centered people, they are more likely to kill themselves rather than deal with adversity.

25
posted on 06/04/2013 6:35:34 AM PDT
by Opinionated Blowhard
("When the people find they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.")

There’s a book called Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl. You should read it. It puts things in perspective. One thing I took away from the book is that suffering is a necessary part of being fulfilled. A result of never having to suffer while maintaining your decency is nihilism. Nihilism is the disease of the West and specifically the Baby Boomers.

27
posted on 06/04/2013 6:38:32 AM PDT
by demshateGod
(The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.)

To hell with baby boomers... At least the good majority of them. Baby boomers are the worst generation. Selfish, freeloading, and all about themselves. Enjoy your cushy pensions and social security. Because SS will be gone for me and my family, pensions don’t even exist anymore.

They sacrificed my future and my children’s future. This political and family structure meltdown was on there watch!

Combine high expectations with a faltering economy, and the risk goes up.

We know that what men want to do is work  thats a very strong ethic for them, . . . The idea that so many of us in this country have been brought up with  that you work hard, you get your house, you get your American dream, everything is rosy  it hasnt worked out. A lot of these boomers arent going to earn as much money as their parents did. They arent going to be as secure as their parents were. And thats quite troubling for the boomers.

They voted for liberalism and are now getting what they voted for. The boomer generation largely turned away from God and country and they are finding that without God and country there's not a whole lot left. It's hard for me to feel pity for a group that did this to themselves.

There's Always Tomorrow is a remake of a 1934 film of the same name. Fred MacMurray is a toy company executive whose wife (Joan Bennett) and kids (Gigi Perreau, William Reynolds and Judy Nugent) take him for granted. Barbara Stanwyck is Fred's former girlfriend, whose own business activities result in a surprise reunion. MacMurray falls back in love with Stanwyck and prepares to leave his family. MacMurray's children go to Stanwyck and politely ask her to back off. She does so, and MacMurray's wife Bennett, who's been out of town during all this, is none the wiser. In the original There's Always Tomorrow, the male and female leads (Frank Morgan and Binnie Barnes) were farther apart age-wise, making their brief encounter all the more poignant.

34
posted on 06/04/2013 6:48:22 AM PDT
by central_va
(I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)

Great post! My solution is to "Go Galt", or more specifically, "go Hank Rearden". When I hear a co-worker complain about how unappreciated they are by their family, I urge them to read Atlas Shrugged. Focus on the metamorphosis that Henry Rearden goes through regarding his relationship with his mother and worthless brother.

There was a lot of Hank Rearden in my stepfather. I just didn't know it until I read the book. My admiration for him, always positive, grows more with each day. He set a great example for me, in the way he lived his life.

36
posted on 06/04/2013 6:48:29 AM PDT
by Night Hides Not
(The Tea Party was the earthquake, and Chick Fil A the tsunami...100's of aftershocks to come.)

Well we cant all be happy, ripe old Senators where they finally exit their cushy abodes with a smile on their face and wheeled away in the stiff horizontal position. The taxpayers get suicided instead for the privilege of funding the barons and nobles in the DC Castle of The Ivory.

The “Boomer” was a twit. They talk about their education and productivity when most of them were receiving wealth and opportunities from parents wealthy enough to give such things to them. I saw a sample large enough to make the generalization. They largely spent their wealth on recreation, became pseudo liberals and as stated became all around superficial, arrogant twits! I can see an increased suicide rate among the “Boomer” population. In general, repeat in general they did not amount to much as people.

39
posted on 06/04/2013 6:50:11 AM PDT
by AEMILIUS PAULUS
(It is a shame that when these people give a riot)

You have 40 million Americans out of work who should be supporting their families with income. Another group perhaps as large is now under-employed making far less than they used to. They are qualified to do more. Their jobs have been moved off shore.

These people suffer depression. They suffer feelings of inadequacy, futility, abject failure...

I’m sure some study will be launched to find out the real causes of this increase in suicide. Heaven forbid we look at the answer right in front of our noses.

It’s easier to get a divorce today than it is to apply for a credit card. The stigma of a man leaving his wife remains. The stigma of a poor wife having to make a ‘tough decision’ because she’s unhappy is heralded, championed, considered to be evidence of real character.

And so it goes folks...

America..., what a country.

45
posted on 06/04/2013 6:54:27 AM PDT
by DoughtyOne
(Funny thing happened on the way to the Constitution burning, Lefties rights were violated...)

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